Because we "politicized" Wellstone's funeral, we lost Minnesota...

[Junkdrawer]

A Senator, his wife and daughter are lost in a plane crash under suspicious circumstances, and Democrats were demonized because his son's saluted their Dad's political memory during a several hour ceremony.

Now Reagan's funeral will be one solid week, and not one peep is made about political exploitation.

Yeah, no double standard here. :eyes:

[GAspnes]

1. If I thought it would help

I'd vomit.

But it won't. Soldier on.

[DenverDem]

2. This is another step in swinging the pendulum back the correct way.

The wrong wing theocons will go so far overboard in blowing up the hegiography of this traitor that more and more folks in the center will begin to see the complete prevarication that all wrong wing phislosophy is.

[Fenris]

3. I'm really getting tired of people acting surprised when something

is politicized. It's almost as if no one notices that anything that can be exploited for political gain is in this country. Standard operating procedures of a polarized society.

[Supormom]

4. My thoughts exactly.

I was thinking of writing to each of the networks to complain, but then I would just sound like "another whiny liberal." Instead I plan to write to MSNBC and applaud them for their tribute to D-Day this evening pointing out that they were the only news network to do so.

[Eric J in MN]

5. I think the memorial service was three hours, not several hours (nt)

nt

[Junkdrawer]

6. I wasn't sure if it was two or three, so I hedged. n/t

[Junkdrawer]

7. For pity sake, JFK was buried in three days...

and that was the assassination of a sitting President - this is clearly an attempt to bury bad news for a week and reset the Presidential race.

I'm sorry, I tried to hold my tongue until he was buried, but this is too much....

[NewYorkerfromMass]

8. maybe you get a day for each year served

I dunno, I am fucking reaching to justify this inexcusable political milking.

[wellstone_democrat]

12. Even my father in law complained!

Of course, he's a WWII vet whose closest friend was being honored today for actions during the landing at Normandy. He is an old-line Republican and less than enthusiastic about Bush* but he is convinced (and called to tell us at length!) that the Reagan funeral is "ridiculous, everyone else even assassinated Presidents are buried in three days---what are they waiting for besides trying to graft that Jackass Bush onto Reagan's reputation"

I'm not thrilled with his steady regard for Reagan but, he calls Bush* "that Jackass" (we capitalize it because he uses it as a first name for the Chimperor) and is *convinced* that Bush* will make it "all about his election campaign!"

When you make Dad suspicious, even if you are a Bush*, you have lost some valuable Republican real estate...

[forgethell]

9. Well, we'll have to do it, then.

It silly to expect the Repukes to do our work for us.

[sadiesworld]

10. Hush...

we're trying to be respectful here.

[John_H]

11. They screamed loud enough. if we don't it's our own fault.

They had Lott out whining that he got booed. I don't think Little Tommy, especially because he's up for reelection, would dare risk anything so "bold."

[Junkdrawer]

13. Here's what the National Review said about the Wellstone funeral...

...

Wellstone's supporters pushed his partisanship over the line at the senator's televised memorial service, turning it into a partisan pep rally. Non-Democratic mourners, such as Sen. Trent Lott and Gov. Jesse Ventura, were booed (Lott and Ventura ultimately walked out); liberal Democrats, such as Jesse Jackson, Ted Kennedy, and the Clintons, were lustily cheered. One eulogist, Richard Kahn, abused the privilege of the lectern by trying to bully Republicans into winning the election for Wellstone's replacement (Fritz Mondale). It was as couth as a political convention, as gross as a rock concert. Even the Minneapolis Star Tribune, one of the most liberal newspapers in the land, editorialized that Kahn's speech was "inappropriate" and "irrational."

....

The pumped-up Wellstone-ites may not have been Marxists, but how many of them were temporarily unhinged by emotion, and how many were modern men, with no emotions to spare from worldly pursuits? When we next feel the chill of the lonesome valley, at a friend's funeral, or on the eve of our own, may we behave differently.

More...

http://articles.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_22_54/ai_94960938

[Junkdrawer]

14. And here's what really happened...

In the period after the memorial there was an immediate organized flood of phone calls to the TV stations organized at the Free Republic website. From the thread it is clear that the callers were ready before the memorial began and were just waiting for a pretext.(Also here. Sample: "But, it is the presence of Hillie and Willie that is truely obsene. Hillie had Paul killed! She knew he would win another term and, thuse, be positioned to run against her for the Presidential nomination in 2008.....In retrospect, I guess it is good that Hillie murdered Paul and that he is dead. It should be easier in 2008 to run against the left leaning criminal than against an American hating communist who would have done anything to destroy this country". ) Freepers also faxed in dozens of complaints to CNN, but according to Aaron Brown these complaints were all word-for-word identical.

Unsurprisingly, there was an immediate complaint from Sarah Janecek of the Minnesota Republican Party in an ABC story which, like most early stories (local; national), was more favorable than not. (Vin Weber of the Minnesota Republican Party was constantly on the phone with the Republican National Commitee during this period.) Janecek also went on Minnesota Public Radio with the false claim that the booing of Lott and Ventura was prompted by large TV screens above the stage. Callers from that show quickly explained that she had confused closed-caption real-time narration of what was happening with prompts, but this false story was immediately picked up by the local Limbaugh clone, Thomas Barnard, whose screeners made sure that the lie could be repeated all day unrefuted. Nationally this hoax was picked up and used very effectively by Limbaugh and many others. (To their credit, the Republican Representative Ramsted and Republican ex-Senator Grams distanced themselves from the nastiness).

Minnesota's self-promoting, lame-duck, unelectable governor Jesse Ventura walked out, thus getting his fifteen minutes of respect from national Republicans who normally think of him as a clown. From his account it is clear that he was looking for trouble: "'I wanted to be there -- I wanted to pay my respects to Paul Wellstone.....I predicted, I said, be prepared, this will be political,' Ventura said of his comments to his wife." Ventura didn't immediately get what he wanted: "All the way through Sheila Wellstone, I turned to the first lady, and said, 'My God, I’m wrong.'" He was referring to speeches made on behalf of Sheila Wellstone and other victims." It was only when Kahn and David Wellstone spoke that Ventura was finally able to stomp out. He then held a series of press conferences, with which he upstaged the Mondale-Coleman debate (and even the hapless Tim Penny, Ventura's designated heir of the little Independence party.) Finally, in a move of quite considerable cheapness, Ventura also rescinded his earlier order to fly the state's flags at half-mast in mourning. (The showboating worked: Ventura will replace Phil Donahue as a talk-show host on MSNBC.)

The final step was for the long knives of the national right wing to weigh in: Peggy Noonan, William Bennett, George Will, and Christopher Caldwell. These seasoned operatives, veterans of many a political street fight, made mincemeat of the unpaid volunteer Rick Kahn, Wellstone's bereaved son David, and the Minnesota Democratic Party (even though the Democrats had not participated in the planning of the memorial.) Noonan and Bennett even had the virtuoso pleasure of packaging their political hit in pious Christian language, so that the Wellstone memorial became an image of the fallenness and depravity of man in this world -- like Willie Horton, except probably worse. (More in story below).


http://www.johnjemerson.com/zizka.memorial.htm

[Justice]

15. Of Course, and Everyone Expected This, However

Knowing this, democrats should have been prepared.

I watched the memorial, and I thought Kahn went on too long and said too much. I appreciate that he was in shock and grieving, but someone should have helped him so that his speech did not go on and on (he made his point, and then remade it and remade it and remade it - sometimes less is more). In the end, Kahn is the one that people pointed to, not David.

Ventura rescinding his order regarding the flags was dishonorable. That order was for Wellstone, not his followers - and nothing that happened at the memorial should have affected the order. It proved Ventura was small minded. Remember he couldn't run again because he would have lost -- and remember his MSNBC show went down in flames.

[Nobody]

16. Having been at the Wellstone memorial...

I'd like to see if any Republican who lost a best friend AND two members of the best friend's family behave any less emotionally so soon after a tragedy.

I stand by Rick Kahn and always will.

As for the booing, not everyone there participated in the booing. Only one section did.

I'm not going to watch any Reagan coverage (and haven't yet so far), but whatever the Republicans do, it's their business. Let's take the high road and show that we're more civilized than the right wing whiners. But for anyone who does, feel free to point out double standards, since our nation is lousy with them.

I'm so sick of Republicans getting to do whatever they damn well want and Democrats having to keep to the straight and narrow.

Haven't they impeached Bush YET?

[gristy]

18. Sorry, Rick Kahn blew it.

And even more so, whoever was supposed to be in charge of the memorial or advising those in charge of the memorial (the DNC - where the f--- was the DNC????). They blew it big time. BIG TIME.

[Nobody]

19. I think the mistake was in letting the Republicans define the issue

If instead of apologizing (like we always seem to do), we insisted that we were doing the right thing and reminding people of all the positives, the focus wouldn't have stayed on five minutes of the entire 4 hour memorial.

Why not focus of the video of Paul and Sheila? Why not focus on the moving music before the memorial started? Why not focus on the one and only time I ever heard the Star Spangled Banner sung well?

As for the booing, you can't ensure a crowd that size reacts the way you want them to.

I know the Republicans are going to do the same and the media will let them off without a peep of protest.

I HATE double standards.

[Junkdrawer]

21. The point is the double standard...

Do you think the media will say a word if an emotional Reagan supporter over-praises Reagan?

[dusty64]

17. All this talk of a

"reagan effect" is crap and WAY overblown. I know the rightwing is desperate to create one but it ain't gonna happen. The man may as well have been dead for the last ten years and a large portion of the electorate either doesn't remember him or has a negative memory of those years. Let em try, its NOT gonna happen and only reveals their complete lack of ANYTHING positive to run on this year.

[Nobody]

20. Does anyone remember Konstantin Chernenko?

When Chernenko became premier of the Soviet Union, I remember everyone going on and on about how old he was and how he was too old to run a country.

I also remember knowing that Ronnie was older and pointing it out to people.

[Az]

22. The difference

The right has a machine in place to blast the left whenever they raise their head out of the bunker. The left has no such machine in place. Expect to see Republicans riding around on Reagan's corpse for weeks to come with no calls for decorum coming from the left.

Its not about the votes. Its about the message. The right has figured this out. So while the Democratic Leadership courts centerist votes the right continues to dominate the medium and drag us ever further to the right.

[Junkdrawer]

23. Bingo.

:thumbsup:

[Beetwasher]

24. Excellent Point! They Are Whoring Out Reagan's Death To A Degree

Never before witnessed in human history. From the NYT:

"...Mr. Bush and his political advisers embraced the legacy of Ronald Reagan on Sunday, suggesting that even in death, Mr. Reagan had one more campaign in him — this one at the side of Mr. Bush."

And they complained about the Wellstone funeral?

I happen to be glad their doing it though. This is ANOTHER idiotic move by the moron known as Rove. Yet ANOTHER mission accomplished for the boy jeenyus. People are going to wretch at the comarisions. You can't pull this off w/ his current approval ratings.

[Junkdrawer]

25. "My Gawd, they're doing the Stations of the Cross"...

- reaction from Mrs. Junkdrawer upon hearing the funeral agenda on the radio.

[dansolo]

26. The really disturbing thing

The people who are slavishly devoted to Reagan have been planning his funeral since the day that he left office. I really get the impression that they have been more interested in his image and his legacy than for the man himself. For all her faults, at least Nancy was true to him all the way to the end. For that, she has my respect.